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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28584777">Company</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/redtoblack/pseuds/redtoblack'>redtoblack</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Magicians (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Baking, Birthday Fluff, M/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 05:48:30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,314</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28584777</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/redtoblack/pseuds/redtoblack</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Quentin attempts to bake, and later finds a welcome surprise in the garden.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Quentin Coldwater/Eliot Waugh</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Peaches and Plums Stockings 2020</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Company</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/salem_student/gifts">salem_student</a>.</li>



    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Happy close-to-Birthday Time! &lt;3</p>
<p>Thank you grimweather for the beta!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Quentin couldn’t cook. Josh could, but he was known for his, um — creativity, with ingredients, and Quentin didn’t think he really wanted that right now. So despite the fact that he couldn’t cook, Quentin found himself in the kitchens dead early — like, the sun wasn’t even up yet, it was so early — baking with Josh. Together, hopefully their strengths would balance out: Quentin with the not putting dried squid eyes in the cake batter, and Josh with the how do you actually make cake batter in the first place.</p>
<p>Eliot wouldn’t mind the collaboration, he didn’t think. Josh was invited to the dinner, after all, though Quentin had an inkling that may be at least partly because of Margo.</p>
<p>And besides, he figured Eliot would want his birthday cake to be <em>good,</em> actually, so in the end he’d appreciate that Quentin got help.</p>
<p>They were trying not to go too ambitious with it, which meant a recipe Quentin had still felt wildly dubious about his ability to achieve, but Josh assured him it would be fine. When Quentin dumped in salt instead of sugar, he used an enchanted slotted spoon to remove the offending ingredient; when Quentin somehow broke the mixer, he pulled out a spare; and when Quentin cut the layers at a terrible angle, he showed him how to adjust a common mending spell to reattach the broken pieces.</p>
<p>The man had an impressive amount of patience.</p>
<p>In the end, sitting on the table in front of them was a two-tier cake, the bottom vanilla and the top carrot, with a strong but not too sweet vanilla buttercream icing. He’d even spent long, nerve-wracking minutes sketching out a pretty “Happy Birthday, Eliot” onto parchment paper, which Josh had piped over with melted chocolate and was busily setting in the freezer cupboard Margo had set up for them.</p>
<p>“Alrighty, amigo, I’ve got some roasts to roast and tastes to test, if you know what I mean, so if you wanna get back here in about five hours, I’ll have a break and we can finish putting this together, and then just sling it in the fridge until tonight,” Josh said in his usual jovial whirlwind manner, dusting off his hands on his apron. Which had far fewer stains on it than Quentin’s did, he noted as he haphazardly pulled it over his head. There was a moment of looking around for somewhere to put it until Josh took pity and lifted it from his outstretched fist.</p>
<p>“That’s great, thanks! So I’ll just, uh,” he turned and took a few steps towards the door, “see you before lunch?” At Josh’s enthusiastic thumbs-up, he ducked the rest of the way out the door and set about finding things to do until everyone else got up.</p>
<p>Not that there were a whole lot of options, or that what options there <em>were</em> were very good ones. He visited Abigail, but she and Rafe were having a very in-depth discussion of the merits of different types of wood for sloth perches. Despite the really slow conversation speed, it took hardly any time at all to realize he wouldn’t have a whole lot to add. He stopped by Tick’s office on his way outside, but the man was muttering out loud to himself about how he “would...<em>not</em> be happy to host the Lorians again,” and Quentin backed out of there before he could pulled into it.</p>
<p>Hoping for some peace and quiet, his next attempt landed him in the gardens. Sweetness filled the air from the early morning dew, and when he brought a drop to his tongue on a whim, it tasted like honey. There were wind chimes somewhere, sending out crinkled peals on the breeze, and the view of the morning sky was vast in hopeful pastel.</p>
<p>Following the curve of the eastern terrace, he found himself approaching a figure already seated on his favorite carved stone bench — Eliot. Ethereal in the gathering sunlight, but so present, so <em>there</em>, all the beautiful colors around them paling to grayscale in comparison. The stir of the slight breeze ruffled his hair under the ridge of his crown, and the wide ankle of his pants billowed out where one knee was drawn up comfortably under his chin. Hands on his knee and head resting on top, he looked more at peace than Quentin had seen him in ages. He might have even been asleep, except that as Quentin drew nearer he lifted his head to look around at him.</p>
<p>“You’re up early,” he greeted, making room on the bench for Quentin to sit beside him.</p>
<p>“I could say the same to you,” Quentin said, leaning back to fold both knees to his chest, arms a comfy circle around his shins.</p>
<p>Eliot smiled and tucked his chin back into the cradle of his hand. “I wanted to see the sun rise on my birthday.”</p>
<p>Quentin studied him. “The last time I was there for your birthday, you were hungover and slept until 2 pm when Margo dragged you out of bed, and then threw an impromptu orgy that started at six.”</p>
<p>Fondness at the memory spread and faded across Eliot’s face in profile.</p>
<p>“I did this when I was a kid,” he admitted, eyes fixed softly on the sun as wisps of cloud drifted along overhead, dappling the glow on his face. “Get up before the sun, before my chores started, so I could have a minute to myself. I’d go sit with the cows and watch the sun come up, and pretend I could stay out there all day, just do whatever I wanted.”</p>
<p>He turned his head, resting his cheek on his ringed hands to look at Quentin. If he was surprised to find Quentin already watching him, he didn’t show it, just smiled softly. “And now I’m a king,” he continued with a little lift of his eyebrows, as if to add a <em>somehow</em> to the end of that statement. “I could stay out here all day, I could spend all of it by myself if I want to.” A chuckle. “I could even get drunk, high, or both, not have to think about it until it’s already tomorrow.”</p>
<p>Although he kept pausing, the faraway look in his eyes said he wasn’t looking for a response, not yet — so Quentin waited. And when Eliot moved a hand to set on the cool stone between them, upturned — he took it, squeezing gently.</p>
<p>“But I don’t want to do that,” he said, almost wonderingly, and searched Quentin’s gaze like he could find something there. And maybe he did. “I don’t want to spend it alone anymore, either.”</p>
<p>Quentin let that settle, like the mist in the slowly warming air around them. “Hey —” he started on impulse, sitting up a little and clasping Eliot’s hand in both of his, “do you wanna eat cake for breakfast?”</p>
<p>A delighted laugh burst out of Eliot, a happy little bird taking flight from its nest. “There’s cake?”</p>
<p>“Yeah, I, um. Well, Josh and I, we made you a cake. Like, um, just now. It’s not really done yet, but like, it’s your cake, so if you wanna eat some now, who’s gonna stop you? I know I won’t,” Quentin joked, holding up his hands in a shrug and standing to slowly step back from the bench, lingering in a way that pulled Eliot up to standing with him, an indulgent grin painting his cheeks.</p>
<p>“Yeah, Q, okay. Let’s go steal some of my own cake,” he announced, pressing a kiss to Quentin’s cheek and taking off for the kitchens on those long legs of his.</p>
<p>Later that night, when Margo asked exasperatedly why a slice was already missing from Eliot’s birthday cake, they shared a really unsubtle grin. And all Eliot said was an innocent, “Why, a growing king needs his sustenance, Bambi.”</p>
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